


Heart of Ice

by Erdariel



Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Athos Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Not That Anyone Else Has Fun Either, Pre-Canon, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 08:30:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21407233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erdariel/pseuds/Erdariel
Summary: Athos, Porthos, and Aramis are carrying important secret letters to Paris. So of course they are attacked.
Comments: 13
Kudos: 32





	Heart of Ice

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in December of the same year when Savoy happened. I'm working based on my headcanons, and in them Athos joined the regiment in late summer or early autumn of that same year.
> 
> I suppose I should note that this is heavily based on headcanons me and Mademoisellesnowflake have developed in our private conversations on tumblr. We headcanon that after Milady's "death" Athos became very cold and closed off, by the logic that no one and nothing can hurt him (emotionally speaking) if he doesn't care about anyone. Also, we headcanon that at first Athos and Aramis didn't get along all that well.

Aramis was being very deliberately annoying. It was, in Athos’s opinion, just fine. At least he’d learned Athos didn’t want him being friendly. Four whole months of going out of his way to spite him at every turn was just childish, though. Why the hell did Captain Treville keep Aramis in the regiment?

“Hey, mister stone statue, are you going to eat or did you take the food just to watch it go cold on your plate?” Aramis asked.

Athos sighed and said nothing. He got up, took his food, and moved where he didn’t have to look at Aramis. Unfortunately this took him away from the campfire’s warmth, but at least he didn’t have to listen to Aramis. Besides, this was the last night he’d have to stand this; they should reach Paris by afternoon the following day.

He heard Porthos and Aramis talking quietly about something. Their voices were too low for Athos to make out what they were saying, but there was a gentle, warm affection in their tones. Loneliness cut Athos’s heart with a cold, cruel blade as he heard it. No, he reminded himself. It is better this way. Loneliness is a lesser pain than betrayal, and far easier to bear than a friend’s death. If I don’t want to hurt myself again, this is the right choice.

He finished his meal and returned to the fire. Aramis glanced at him briefly, then acted as if he wasn’t there at all. Porthos smiled at him. Athos turned his eyes away from Porthos, from that stupid, bright, _friendly_ smile. Why wouldn’t Porthos accept that he didn’t want friends, he didn’t want that smile? He just wanted to be left alone, so no one could hurt him.

“I’ll take the watch tonight”, he offered, his voice toneless as ever.

“Fine by me”, Aramis said, for once without a trace of mockery in his voice or choice of words. He looked up at the sky, frowning, and added: “It’s going to snow tonight.”

Athos was going to answer with something about how such things tended to happen in mid-December, but held his tongue. There was something in Aramis’s voice. Not quite fear, but close to it. Something that suggested it was more than just an observation of the weather. Something that made Athos feel like sarcastic comments about the matter would be needlessly cruel.

Porthos looked at Aramis, sudden worry in his eyes. “Will you be alright?”

Aramis nodded. He rose and went inside the tent. Porthos got up, intending to follow him.

“Don’t let the fire go out”, he told Athos before he vanished into the tent, too.

Most of the watch passed uneventfully. It did indeed start snowing roughly an hour and a half after Aramis and Porthos had gone to sleep. The wind rose soon afterwards. It was very cold.

Athos did his best to not look at the fire and keep his eyes adjusted to the dark, but adding wood to the fire was impossible to do without the light blinding him for a while. So of course the attack came just as he was doing so.

The sound of a gun shattered the silence of the night. By a stroke of luck, Athos had been looking to the right direction to see the spark of light as the gun fired, but in the dark he knew firing back would be a futile effort. It was another stroke of luck that the first bullet didn’t hit.

“Porthos! Aramis! We’re under attack!” he shouted at the top of his lungs.

He ran to the horses, cursed the cold that had stiffened his fingers as he untied their reins from the tree-branch. He heard Aramis and Porthos getting up, heard their steps as they ran to where he and the horses were. They all knew this was not a time to try to fight. They didn’t know how many men they were up against, and no one was at their sharpest when suddenly awakened in the middle of the night. It was better to not be overly concerned with honor and courage and fighting in a way that would look good in later times’ heroic tales, and just make sure the precious letters they had would reach Paris and the King and wouldn’t fall into enemy hands.

Athos mounted his horse and urged it to canter, then to gallop. Aramis and Porthos followed soon after him. He slowed just enough to let them reach him.

“You have the letters, right?” Porthos yelled over the howling wind and the thunder of hooves.

“Yes!” Athos answered.

They heard the sound of more horses from behind them. More than one, but it was impossible to say how many. It was unnecessary, too. All that mattered was that they were being pursued and could not afford getting caught.

They rode through the cold night, wind biting at their faces and tearing their clothes. Athos urged the horse into as fast a speed as he dared in the dark. Still they couldn’t shake off their enemies, and it seemed to Athos that the enemies were actually closing in on them.

He recalled, vaguely, that there was a place just before the forest turned into fields, where there was bit of a hill on either side of the road, and the terrain outside the road was too rough to cross swiftly, and even harder to travel on in the dark with a layer of snow obscuring the features of the ground. In that place, one man could possibly hold many enemies for a while. And the place wasn’t very far, it was near enough that they’d reach it before their pursuit caught up…

It couldn’t be called a plan, except out of kindness, but it could work. It could buy the ones who wouldn’t stay enough time that their pursuers couldn’t catch up again. Problem was, it would take too long to explain. Besides, Athos wasn’t cruel, only cold for his own sake. He had chosen the lonely path, but he wouldn’t force others onto it. And he wouldn’t force them to experience what had brought him to walk that path in the first place. It would be plain cruel to make Aramis lose Porthos, or the other way around. Besides, both of them had been Musketeers longer than Athos. They had more experience, which was far more valuable than any skill Athos had.

“Porthos!” he yelled, matching his horse’s speed to Porthos so that they were riding side by side.

“What?”

“Take the letters!” Athos took the leather-wrapped bundle he’d carried and held it where Porthos could reach it.

“What? Why?” Porthos asked again. Athos didn’t look at him, but he could hear the change in Porthos’s tone of voice. “You’re not going to–”

“Take them!”

Porthos took the letters. Athos dropped back, and as Porthos and Aramis rode on, he slowed slightly more, just slightly, as if he was still attempting to escape but his horse was beginning to tire.

When he reached the place he’d chosen for making a stand, Aramis and Porthos had already gained some distance to him. They hadn’t yet disappeared from sight, but it wouldn’t take long, especially when it was snowing so much. He stopped his horse and turned it around. He peered into the darkness, waiting for the enemies to get there.

He had for weapons two pistols, and his sword and dagger. It would have to be enough, even though he knew he was likely to miss at least one if not both of his shots, and he wouldn’t have time to reload.

It took only minutes for the enemies to catch up, but it felt like hours to Athos. Then finally he saw vague shapes among the falling snow. He drew his pistol, took a deep breath, and fired. He aimed for the horse; it was a larger target, easier to hit in the dark. He heard an equine scream and saw the horse falter, then fall. He heard a surprised and far more human shout as the horse fell. A better shot than he had hoped. It would take the rider a moment to sort himself out and be ready to fight again, provided that he hadn’t broken his neck and died or something when the horse fell. But there was no time for celebrating. Athos cast the useless gun aside and drew the other one. This time he aimed for the rider. And missed.

He swore, threw that gun away, too, and drew his sword. He stayed on his horse and waited. It would be far too easy for the enemies to just ride over him if he dismounted. He made his horse move about a bit, just enough to make himself a harder target to shoot.

It nearly worked, but only nearly. One of his enemies – he saw now that there were four still alive and in action – raised his gun and shot, and the bullet hit him in the stomach. Not quite in the middle, and with the leather coat and several layers of clothes Athos was wearing underneath it to keep himself warm in the cold, the bullet didn’t go as deep as it could have. It hurt still. It hurt incredibly much. It was sheer stubbornness that made Athos keep fighting.

Then the first of the enemies was close enough for Athos to use his sword. He’d never fought with swords on horseback before, and it was damned hard. At least, a small bit of him thought, if things go the way they seem to be going now, I’ll never have to do this again.

He exchanged blows with his opponent, and it seemed to be going absolutely nowhere. Many of the best tricks Athos knew simply did not work on horseback, and he suspected things were the same for the other man. On the other hand, their fight blocked the entire road. The longer Athos could keep the fight on, the more time he bought for Aramis and Porthos.

It was pure luck that finally won the fight for Athos. Athos made a strike that was blocked just a little too close to the other horse’s ear. The horse panicked, and though the rider was able to stop it from bolting away, he was off-balance and concentrating on something other than the fight for a moment. Athos used that moment to cut the man’s throat open. He backed his horse as the dead man fell from his own.

But while they’d fought, the rest of the enemies had had plenty of time to load their guns. As soon as they didn’t have to worry about hitting one of their own, they were ready to shoot. Only one of them missed. One bullet hit Athos’s right shoulder and he cried in pain as it tore through his flesh. The pain was so bad he could hardly move his arm.

A few seconds later, another bullet hit him in the chest. It was the last straw to his exhausted and injured body. He fell from the saddle and into the soft fresh snow on the side of the road.

The enemies paid no more attention to him. They rode off, leaving him to freeze or bleed out, whichever death would get him first.

Athos closed his eyes. He understood that he would die there, alone in the cold and dark. It should have scared him, but he was too tired to fear. Besides, it was a fitting punishment. He had left Anne to die alone, denied her the opportunity to have someone who would truly listen and care hear her last words. Now he would die alone, too. It was right. A small, calm smile rose to the lips that hadn’t known smiles since the summer. He was tired, and his mind drifted somewhere on the borders of wakefulness and sleep, of reality and dream, of life and death.

The first thing that Athos knew when he woke up was pain. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, just a dull ache in his shoulder and stomach, and a sharper pain in his chest that worsened every time he drew breath.

The second and third things he knew were warmth, and the softness of a bed, the weight of a blanket over him.

It was too comfortable to be Hell, but if he’d been in Heaven he wouldn’t have felt pain. Besides, he’d sinned far too much to be welcome in Heaven. Therefore, Athos decided, he had to be alive.

He opened his eyes. The roof above him was wood, a little darkened with age, but not too badly. The shadows flickered and moved in the way that suggested multiple light sources… maybe a few candles, and yes, that was definitely the sound of fire burning in a fireplace. He heard footsteps at a distance that might have been on the other side of the room.

“Athos? Are you awake?” he heard a familiar voice say, but in a tone that carried a hint of worry Athos was unaccustomed to hearing in it.

“I think so, Captain”, he replied.

He heard footsteps cross the floor, and turned his head to see Captain Treville sit down on a chair by the bed. Treville's expression was carefully neutral, but there was indeed a hint of worry visible in his eyes, too.

"Before you ask, you were brought here around sunrise yesterday morning. It's now about five in the afternoon", Treville informed him. “Aramis and Porthos got here unharmed, brought the letters to me, and all but forced me to send a few men, them included, back to help you, and try and catch the attackers.”

“Remind me again, who’s the captain of this regiment?” Athos asked, a weary but amused smile on his lips.

Treville made a face that was probably supposed to look indignant, but didn’t quite succeed. Then the spark of laughter died from his eyes, and his face turned serious again.

“I wouldn’t have liked to send Aramis, especially not when I didn’t think they would find you alive, but there’s no reasoning with him sometimes…” Treville’s voice trailed off, and he sighed and turned his head so that Athos couldn’t see his face. “Our enemies had the sense to turn and run when they realized they couldn’t catch Aramis and Porthos before they reached Paris and got away. The men I sent found you lying by the road around where Porthos said he thought they would, and I don’t suppose you have any idea what a miracle it was that you were still alive.”

Athos wondered briefly how him being alive should be in any way a good, miraculous thing. In his opinion it was more a curse than a blessing. He decided, however, that it wasn’t a wise thing to say aloud.

“I would just like to know”, Treville continued, with some sharpness in his voice, “what devil possessed you to do that?”

“Which would you have rather lost instead, Captain? Aramis or Porthos? Or perhaps all three of us, and the letters, too? They would have caught up with us long before we reached Paris if someone hadn’t stayed to hold them back. I knew the one who stayed was likely to die, and all things considered, I am the most expendable of the three of us. They have been Musketeers longer than I have; they have experience I have yet to gain. It is faster and easier to replace me than either of them. Besides, they have personal ties to other Musketeers that I neither have nor want. The loss of either of them would be worse for the whole regiment than my death.” Athos spoke calmly, with no emotion of any kind visible on his face or audible in his voice.

Treville stared at him. Athos looked back steadily until Treville had to give up and look away. What Athos had said made sense. In a horrible, cold, logical way, it made sense. A cold, logical way that Treville could never in a thousand years learn to think in. If the reasoning had been something like "I could not let my friends die" it would have been easier to accept. Except that Athos, of course, had isolated himself from the rest of the regiment, reacting to every offer of friendship with polite coldness that drove anyone away. He probably didn't care about anyone enough to die for them. On the other hand, it wasn't the same malicious, often self-centered coldness Treville had seen in Cardinal Richelieu and all too many other powerful men. Athos had condemned himself to death and accepted it with the same seemingly emotionless cold he treated other people with. Treville didn't believe Richelieu would be as eager to do so.

“It was still madness", he said at last. "It was a miracle you survived until you were found, and even with Aramis there to help you it was another damn miracle they got you here alive."

"Aramis? Helping me?" Athos snorted. "He hates me."

Treville sighed and glanced quickly upwards, a silent plea for God to grant him patience in dealing with everything. He looked at Athos, and sighed.

"Hates you?" Treville shook his head. "God, no. He's… he's been hurt. And I suppose he's trying to take the pain out on someone, and since you responded so coldly on any attempt at friendliness, it was easier to take it on you. I think. I haven't asked. It doesn't mean he's not making an ass of himself by acting that way, but he doesn't hate you either. And frankly, you haven't been exactly kind to others yourself."

Treville kept his voice well under control, but his face betrayed him. Athos saw deep pain and something that might have been guilt in his eyes and the way his mouth was set. Then Treville turned away, apparently thinking Athos hadn't noticed the look on his face yet. Later Athos would think that this was the moment he first understood that Aramis was to Treville more like a son than a subordinate. Even later than that, he would find out the true root and reason for that flash of guilt he'd seen. Now, however, he was too tired and in too much pain to be so analytical about it, and he simply noted it with a bit of surprise and then ignored it.

"Fine. Maybe he doesn't hate me. That still doesn't mean I want or need friends. If he wishes to get along with me on missions, he needs to accept that instead of trying to find out how much longer I have the self-control to stand his insults", Athos said.

Treville shrugged. He stood up and looked at Athos once more. The young man seemed terribly pale, and Treville saw how he grimaced each time he shifted or moved at all. Still he had to wonder if there wasn't some other pain in his heart, something deeper and caused by worse things than blades of steel and bullets of lead, and better hidden. Still, if he didn't wish to talk about it…

"Your friendships, or the lack of them, are no concern of mine. Sort things out with Aramis how you like, but it's not something I am going to get involved in", he said. "I must go now. I've stayed longer than I should, and the King wanted to see me today. I can only hope what he wants of me is something sensible this time."

Athos stared after him for a while. He wondered at the unhidden, genuine worry the Captain had shown towards him. Why would anyone care for him? Anyone, let alone Porthos and Aramis who already had each other as friends, or Captain Treville who certainly had his hands full of work with running the regiment?

In a way, it felt good. He’d missed being treated kindly, even as he’d turned away from kindness and hardened his heart against the world. And yet he wasn’t sure whether to give in and accept that warmth he craved, or distance himself again from others. He remembered all too well how it had felt to see Thomas dead, blood staining his white shirt a brilliant scarlet. He remembered how it had felt to understand Anne, his beautiful Anne, had lied of everything, had killed his brother, had betrayed him. How it had hurt, even then, to give her a death sentence, to have her hanged.

No, it was better to deny kindness and friendships. It was better not to care. If he cared, he’d only be hurt again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I know. Rapiers, far as I was able to find out, weren't weapons you'd use mounted, and there's a few other things in the chapter that probably wouldn't in real life work, but let's ignore that for the sake of action, epicness, and a good story, okay? It's not like the canon of the show is very historically accurate either...
> 
> If you have anything to say, please comment, I love hearing your thoughts about my writing!

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I know. Rapiers, far as I was able to find out, weren't weapons you'd use mounted, and there's a few other things in the chapter that probably wouldn't in real life work, but let's ignore that for the sake of action, epicness, and a good story, okay? It's not like the canon of the show is very historically accurate either...
> 
> If you have anything to say, please comment, I love hearing your thoughts about my writing!


End file.
